December in 5 minutes

OK, so I've resorted to month-long blogs.  I would love to be one of those clever bloggers that has something witty or prolific or even halfway interesting to say just from living life each passing day, but let's face it...I'm not that person.  So you get what you get. :)

As usual, our December was jam-packed.  From anniversary parties to work events and travel to Christmas Concerts and a musical, and well shopping and wrapping and baking.

And even now, I'm tired.  The only thing standing between me and hittin' the hay is my promise to myself to update this dang thing and my Rolling Stone recapping 2011.  No, I don't normally read Rolling Stone, but I couldn't find a People or an Entertainment magazine, so this edition looked promising.  So far, so good.

So here you go...

Early December, we threw an overdue 40th anniversary party for my awesome parents.  We were so grateful to have everyone turn out.  It was crappy weather and most guests didn't know how to get to my house without some type of GPS device.

Here is everyone that made it.  Somehow, the flash went off and everyone was smiling and looking toward the camera and their eyes were open!!  Thanks to all who celebrated with us.

The happy couple!  Happy 40th anniversary Mom & Dad!

An awesome picture.  Too bad such a rare moment.

This is Aunt Linda's creation.  She brainstormed with a local bakery and had this awesome cake highlighting key moments along their "road to 40 years".

On the 17th, Mom and I spent the entire day baking.  The entire day!  We always make way more cookies than we need.  And then when it comes time to making up plates for people, we're like "okay who else can we give cookies to?" Ha!  The best part for me is time with my mom (and the chocolate chip cookies that I'll grab from the freezer later in February will be a nice treat too!)

This was our only trip to visit Santa this year.  I would have liked to go visit a real Santa.  This was the' Breakfast with Santa' Santa at Camryn's school.  And he clearly painted his beard.  Blah!  Ah well. It's a decent shot.  Darcy wouldn't go near him without me there.  At her school, Santa came by to visit her classroom and the teachers said she ran away from him but kept saying "ho, ho, ho" the rest of the afternoon.  Never heard her actually say "santa" this year.  It was always "ho, ho, ho" anytime she saw him on TV or a picture.  So cute!

Darcy posing before her Christmas concert.

We were here a total of 10 minutes.  Drop Darcy off, sit down, watch Darcy stare out to the audience, pick Darcy up from her teachers and head home. (Craig was really happy to go. LOL!)

The highlights just keep coming.  We bought Charlotte a ticket to see Beauty & the Beast at the Fox Theatre for Christmas.  It turned into a gift for me and Camryn too. Charlotte came over and spent the night.  Then the "big girls" went to the finest dining establishment within 10 minutes of our house...Red Robin, where the girls dined on corn dogs and mandarin oranges.  (YUCK!)  They got so tired of me taking their picture.  But both of them will do goofy smiles (or not smile at all) at different times, so my odds are better if I just keep snapping away.

Getting ready to see the show!

So excited.  And they're so pretty in their fancy dresses.

A quick intermission.  The girls looked through the windows overlooking the lobby.  Must have seen somethign they liked.

As for Christmas, well, we had a fantastic one.  Can't even tell you how blessed my whole family is to have one another and be able to enjoy each other.  Jeff flew in for several days and got lots of time with the nieces.  They just flock to him, and he soaks it up and lets them climb all over him.

And onto Christmas Morning...

Charlotte Grayce

Charlotte and Darcy passing out the gifts.  This is about all Darcy wanted to do with the gifts until someone would open one for her and she realized there was something to play with inside.

Mom got Charlotte and Camryn these Hello Kitty hats.  LOVE them.  They are so cute on.

Here's one from earlier int he morning.  Darcy was going through her stocking and showing us what she got. :)

Jeff strumming on his new mandolin.

Jon and Craig got these books from a secret person (Dad) called "Go the F&*$ to sleep".  I had read it before but it really is so funny and painfully true.  Jon was crying he was laughing so hard at the book.

Maybe next year she will learn that toys take too much work to get them out of the box.  But the baby Rapunzel was a hit with the grand kids, which was all she needed to know.

For the two people that read this, I hope you enjoyed.  I wish you a blessed and healthy 2012.

Pumpkin Patch

One of my FAV trips every year is getting the family out on a beautiful October day and picking out pumpkins.  We opted to go to a much less crowded farm this year as we knew it would be less stress on us if we could just let Darcy run around wherever she wanted to go.  No ponies or lemonade this year, but we still had a great time.

Carmyn stopped to pose by the straw maze.

One of these years she will be too big for these rides and it will break her heart.

AT LAST!  A half smile out of Darcy when the camera is on.  She is such a stinker.

Darcy might look happy but is actually screaming because her sister touched her.  LOL!

Aww...my favorite shot of the day.

Silly Darcy

(There are two videos here, so if you don't see anything at first, hit refresh, or wait for a bit so they can load.)

Old McDonald Had a Farm

Went to one of MU's farms last weekend with Jon, Liz, Charlotte & Riley.

Awesome time.  Darcy was in heaven.  She has been practicing her moos and nays and quacks.  She thought it was so funny after she got to touch the horse.

Later at dinner, Uncle Jon was entertaining Darcy.

VIDEO

Kindergarten Bound

Camryn was thrilled to go to school today.  First day of kindergarten.  I think I was less nervous because I got to take her to her first day instead of some big yellow bus shuttling my baby off to the big kids school.  She is not riding the bus because it comes too late for Craig or I to help her get on the bus.  Parents have to be there to get the kindergartner on and off the bus, so we had to enroll her in before/after care at the school.

Here are some pics from this morning. 

She got up and dressed really fast to take a picture with her Daddy before he left for school.

She has to get up early enough to eat breakfast at the house now.  And here she is having a healthy meal of Apple Jacks.  Yuck! 

Headed to school.  Showing off her all pink backpack.  She is so proud of it.  She picked out patches that I sewed onto the front of the bag.



And we're off.  SOOOOOOOOOOOO excited.  Darcy is just chilling out.  Not sure what the big deal is.



Little sister has been dropped off and the big girl arrives at Discovery Ridge Elementary for her first day.

In front of her classroom.  The school's mascot is the Stars.  Her teacher had put a name of each kid in the class on a star for the entrance to the classroom.

And since it wasn't time to start school yet, we checked in at Chatauqua which is the before care at her school.  They had tons of toys and games to play with.  One of the neighbors was there as well, so she knew someone right away.  She kept telling me "I'll miss you, mommy."  I'm not sure if she wanted reassurance that I would miss her too, or if she wanted to make me feel good. 

Good luck, Camryn!

Summer Fun

Well, the lack of posting has been due to our crazy summer schedule.  I swear our life slows down when school is in session and a routine has been restored.  And I have not taken that many pictures this summer.  Not sure why.  Maybe having a increasingly heavy baby on my hip grabbing at the camera while I'm trying to focus is the cause.  Ha!  Just too many blurry photos.

I will start with the most recent because it's what I remember most.  And then the others will just be some random summer pictures.

I took the day off to play.  Camryn, her friend Marley, and I went to the city museum for the day.  And I mean the day.  I figured we'd be done in a few hours, but we got there at 10 and had to leave at 3:30, still not getting to play with everything there.  I hadn't been since they first opened, and this by far has to be one of the coolest places to take a kid.  I would say at least 4 years old would be ideal because there were a lot of stairs we climbed up and down to go to different sections.

We climbed this rope up the wall and once at the top we got to slide down a pretty steep slide.  Cam was a bit nervous about sliding at first but once I went down with her a couple of times, she was good to go.  It was fun!  And it was nice to see other adults having fun.

Here Camryn is driving a school bus.  It was fun because they could punch all the buttons and even open the door, which was caged off, because where she is sitting she is actually off the top of the building!  This bus was on the roof and hanging off the edge.  Once I pointed that out to Camryn and Marley they looked at me in disbelief.  Then they looked out the window and started screaming!  LOL!

OK, so a mild ride, but these girls hopped on to go through the tunnel a few times.

They turned into butterflies in the art center where they had their faces painted.  When the gal pulled out the glitter paint for the finishing touches you would have thought it was gold.  They were so excited.  (As a bonus the lady even painted a sunflower on my cheek.)

Two painting butterflies.

Back up on the roof, these lily pads were fun to leap on.

And then at some point, the girls decided to leap off the lily pads.

And then they got even more wet.

Two soaking wet butterflies.

And the butterfly paint came off.  Ah well.  So I spent the rest of the afternoon walking around with a sunflower on my cheek and two little girls without paint on their face.  Ha!  I'm sure people thought I was weird for having my face done but not the girls. 

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OK, backing up a bit in the month.  Darcy began walking on July 16th!  I tried to blog about it.  Even had a video to attach, which I will attempt to attach again, but have had no luck.  Sorry if it doesn't work.  She has been so funny to watch.  She walks with her hands up in the air.  And when she does she always has this look of accomplishment and a "see what I'm doing?" look on her face.  It's been a break, a small one, but at least a break on my back as she is walking more. 

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Below are several more pictures from the summer.  Some from June and others from July. 



Charlotte, Camryn, Pepper & Dylan at the annual Horn 4th of July BBQ.

Neighborhood girls dancing to Justin Bieber songs.

Told you this was in random order.  This is is before Darcy was walking around.  Craig tried his hardest to work with her when she would let him.

Little Miss Firecracker.  Isn't she so pretty?

Finally the rain stopped just in time to set off fireworks.  As we waited for the daylight to completely go away the girls set off sparklers.

Not pleased with having to inhale the smoke. Ha!  At some point someone wanted to light a smoke bomb too.  Oh my!

Jon Moore and Ryan contributing to smoke screen by burning off the last of the sparklers.

Half of the firework watching crowd.

The other half.